not counting the last 2 plays dejon and sasser played amazing…watching the replay Dejon had an almost ELITE defensive game, and his offense minus the last 2 minutes were his best of the year (hitting multiple contested layups). sasser hit a lot of shots and 2 of his misses were half way in and rattled out…
i think this game will do more good than bad as far as team development…if you rewatch the game we looked like the better team just kept shooting our self in the foot… this game was tulsa making crazy contested shots and low percentage players having high percentage games, and us missing open shots we regularly make. but a big step in development for dejon and sasser
general notes
tulsa really had a great shooting game (especially the 1st half)…a lot of people will talk about Jackson hitting three 3’s against us, despite being 0-19 for the season…but brandon rachal (tulsa best player) hit a step back heavily contested 3 to start the game…he is career 25% from 3…later in the 1st half a 22% 3pt shooter (hill) hit a crazy contested 3 as well
biggest mistake-
im about to catch CRAZY heat from this from you guys but the biggest mistake made in this game was done by the coaches. the announcers said Sampson told the players in practice the day before to not guard darien jackson on the 3pt line and if you are defending him you should play help defense …though it was smart if going by the percentages (0-19 from 3 prior) that decision was probably our downfall
why it was a mistake: Houston was the verge of blowing out tulsa early second half, jackson’s 4pt play changed the tide, his 3 a minute later closed the gap, his last 3 was crucial for them down 5 with a 1:30… Beyond the 3s he made…i noticed we kept losing track of tulsa players who’d sneak behind and would be fed easy layups.i eventually noticed it was always jackson, and noticed that it isnt that we lost track of him but that whoever was guarding him was playing help defense and when they did he just sneak under the rim and would be fed (atleast 6 of his points)–jackson finished with 1/3 of Tulsa’s points
tons of minor mistakes–
depending on how your perspective is we had a TON of minor fixeable mistakes and still only lost by 2 ; like the foul on the 4 point play, we had a 2 on 1 fastbreak alleyoop that did not connect (lead to an open 3 on the other end, 5pt swing), multiple travel calls…hinton missed an essentially open layup after a steal…we gave up a lot of offensive rebounds for a “good rebounding team” (a lot of it from not boxing out)…multiple bad pass turnovers (i counted 4)–only 1 was dejons fault before he gets all the blame…obviously how we handled our last few offensive possession
we had a TON of open 3s (made some, missed more). …and we could have had more.
They had 3 in the paint at all times and never strayed far…curious why we never tried 4 guards just to see how itd look…they prioritized protecting the paint …would have been interesting with 4 perimeter players…might have created more open looks
Mills
ill start by saying elite 1st half offense…i wish mills was a better passer-after he hit his 3rd three (all in the 1st few minutes of the game) tulsa was selling out to stop him…when he had the ball, there was someone wide open…mills would still shoot it while heavily defended and someone open… i doubt it changes this year, but hope he develops that part of his game for future seasons
mills was visibly tired in the 2nd half (you could see him gasping the 2nd half). and he missed every field goal he attempted the last 7 or so minutes…still curious why we set up a 3 for him on the last play especially when he isnt a shooter
biggest issue at this point of the season…we can’t handle zone defense well.
at one point in the game in the second half they started to pass and then the passing player would move into the zone, that disrupted the zone and created some scoring opps but then they stopped doing it.
i hope coach makes them watch this game over and over until they get the zone penetration burned into thier heads.
There’s nothing about our zone issues that wouldn’t be solved by a true zone-buster. Tulsa took away the flash by the post guys and dared us to beat them from the outside
I can’t believe anyone would question leaving an 0-22 career 3-point shooter to shutdown their more proven scorers.
Agree with PMM. The objective in basketball is getting the ball through the round thing more than the other guy. We do a decent job keeping other teams from getting it in their round thing. We struggle to get it in ours. I think our round thing may be smaller.
It was clear the defensive strategy was to play off of Jackson, and it simply backfired. Sometimes, that happens.
I do think we are getting a little bit better defensively every week. We just haven’t been able to string it together for entire games, but I think that will come later in the season.
This team is on the same trajectory as 2017/2018. It’s a much different team, but as far as playing defense, I think we’re on the same trajectory.
I realize Tulsa’s zone made it more difficult for Fabian to hit the free-throw line jumper, but I feel like he wasn’t even looking to shoot the ball. There were times when he was open, and in normal circumstances, would have taken the shot. It’s almost like they knew his opportunities would be limited with Tulsa’s packed in zone, so he wasn’t ready to shoot when it was open. He passed up multiple jump shots he’s been hitting lately. And one time late in the game, he ended up turning the ball over by dribbling into a double team. He should have just taken the open jumper.
No one is denying the practicality of the strategy but it still played a huge reason in why we lost regardless
Also noting after his first miss… Tulsa coach was clapping encouraging him to keep shooting…
A Tulsa fan showed me an interview where haith said he was one of their best shooters in practice, and thought it was a mental block as why he wasn’t making it in games … the Tulsa fan noted the 19 he missed prior their was at least a semblance of attempting to guard him
Appreciate the rewatch notes. Seems like the team is still searching for the leader and it’s seems Mills will be the go to guy unless someone else steps up.
I 100% agree on Mills missing some passes that were there. He gets tunnel vision but I’m sure that will improve with more experience.
This is the 1st young team in awhile so think we all have forgotten what a rollercoaster that can be. Outside shooting beats a zone but also having a team that has played together awhile and that understand how to play together helps. Now if we are in late February with the same issues that will definitely put a ceiling on the season.
Also who thought Cam Tyson would be missed w/o playing a game yet lol.
But daring a guy to shoot by leaving him wide open can be mentally taxing for a struggling shooter as well. Seems odd that Sampson felt like Tulsa was so good that he had to use a strategy where he left one guy unaccounted for on the perimeter. Surprised we did not see Alley more in this game since size was not a factor.
Let’s look at it this way. Igbanu had had an 18-point game against us last year, and we held him to 6. Horne had a 15-point game last year and scored 10 Saturday, Jackson scored a total of 2 points against us in two games last year and came into this game 0-17 behind the arc.
The coogs are 2-4 this year when Mills is their highest scorer. I don’t think this reflects poorly on Mills, rather it speaks to your point that the rest of the team isn’t getting it going in those games. We are better when Mills is a secondary scoring threat. With Grimes as the highest scorer we are 5-0, and 4-0 with Hinton.
that goes back to the zone…all 4 losses were to teams that played zone heavily
grimes hasnt had 1 good game vs zone all season, i went into the game not expecting much from him…and the way tulsa was defending, fabian wasnt going to have an easy way around it …nate is the only one that i felt could have had a really good game but didint
no but only mills took contested 3s… almost everyone else’s were open (grimes, hinton, sasser and dejon)…grimes 1st 3 was contested that he made…and dejon had 1 that he missed at the of the shot clock that was contested …beyond those 2 and all the ones mills took the rest were all open